New Eyes, New Perspective
by Nee339
Summary: How will the HP story change when there is an outsider piloting Harry's body? This is an SI-OC/self-insert/Harry replacement story, and it won't religiously adhere to canon. There will be severe deviations. You have been warned. Further warnings for Harsh Language, Sexual Situations, Violence, Original Character, and Alternate Universe/Alternate Reality.
1. The Introduction and Chapter 01

**New Eyes, New Perspective**  
By Nee339

**Summary:** This is an experimental quasi self-insert/Harry replacement story. The story won't religiously adhere to canon and there will be deviations. You have been warned. Further warnings for Harsh Language, Sexual Situations, Violence, Original Character, and Alternate Universe/Alternate Reality.

**Disclaimer:** Obviously, I don't own Harry Potter. It is goofy to think otherwise.

* * *

**Introduction: A New Harry Potter**

My first life ended suddenly. My name was Erica Thompson and I was 43 years old when I died. My horse had stumbled on something and, before I knew it, we were tumbling end-over-end down a hill, with me being crushed beneath my horse's considerable weight. I do not remember much after that, but I do know that I died quickly.

Now, in a normal story, here is the part where I'd tell you my beliefs on God and what heaven looked like. But, I truthfully have nothing to say about that. If I had met God and spoke with Him, I do not remember it. The same goes for if I saw heaven and spent any time there with my deceased family members. All I know is that, after I closed my eyes on one life, I opened them on another.

My new name is Harry Potter and I was 5 years old when I awoke to my new existence. Suffice it to say, I was not happy with the new arrangement.

When I was Erica, I had read the Harry Potter books and had watched the Harry Potter movies with my two children. Although my kids had liked the story and had especially liked Harry, himself, I had never had any sense of fondness for Harry Potter's character. I had always thought Harry was too unmotivated and too incurious to be a good hero of the book series, because there was more to life than Quidditch and being the eternal Voldemort-victim, but not according to Harry Potter, it seemed.

Now, had Harry Potter been my brainchild, I would have written him differently so that the reader would see that there was more to the magical world than just corrupt politicians, rampant racism, pointless Quidditch games, endless homework essays, and the struggle between good versus evil. In my version, the magical world would have been larger than just the schoolyard and Diagon Alley, but that was not meant to be, because, in my first life, I had not been an author nor had I ever desired to be one.

As Erica Thompson, I was a Game Warden with the American Fish and Wildlife Service. I had been the stepmother to a teenage girl named Brittany and the biological mother of a 10-year-old-boy named Bryan. I had been the wife to a soft-spoken man named Darren, and I had been happy. I had had many more years left in that life and I was disappointed and heartbroken to have my time cut short because of an accident.

Not once in that past life had I ever been J. K. Rowling or even met the woman. But, I'd read her books and, like them or not, I now found myself standing in front of a woman named Petunia, listening as she told Harry Potter's Kindergarten teacher – correction, _my _Kindergarten teacher – that I was a bad boy, prone to rudeness and all-around bad behavior.

While listening to this lovely introduction, all I could think about was that I was right to dislike Mrs. J. K. Rowling's books, because her idea of the abused boy-hero was so cliché that I was torn between laughing at the ridiculousness of my situation and attacking my new aunt, which would have given credence to all her claims of my delinquent tendencies. That way, at least, my aunt wouldn't be a liar as well as a child abuser.

* * *

**Chapter One: The Beginning**

How does one explain the experience of waking up in a new life?

I don't know how to answer that question because I do not have the words to properly explain. The reality of my situation was so bizarre that I do not have an appropriate comparison, because there isn't one. I now find myself living in a popular young-adult fiction book, walking in the steps of the main character's early childhood, while also being a grown woman wearing the body of a five-year-old-boy. How can anyone relate to that?

I don't think anyone can, but I will try to explain anyway, otherwise, what's the point of writing this at all. So, let's start at the beginning and I'll answer the question that everyone is most interested in reading about, because if I was an outside observer, it would be the first question foremost on my brain as well. How do I feel about switching from female to male?

To answer that, first the reader needs to understand that, upon awakening as Harry Potter, in the cupboard under the stairs, I was very confused about what had happened to me and I was very disconnected from my new reality, let alone from my new body. In my mind, I had been dead not two seconds ago, and then suddenly, I was lying in a dimly lit space with a blanket wrapped around me. Before I was even able to process where I was, Petunia had swung open the cupboard door and had dragged me out into the hallway.

She was angry with me because I was having trouble standing and maintaining my balance with her grip on my arm and forcing it high above my head. Also, my mind was reeling and the floor seemed to sway back and forth beneath my feet, like the deck of a boat rolling with the waves. My eyes told my brain that I was in a house that I had never been in before and, for the life of me, I couldn't conceive of a situation wherein any of these facts made any sense.

Furthermore, the furniture and decorations were severely out of date. The television in the family room was large and blocky, with two wire antennas and a rotary-dial to turn the channels. The walls had floral-print wallpaper and I could see Victorian lamps resting on blocky glass-topped end tables, and a peach-colored couch with a knitted mustard-yellow and burnt-orange afghan neatly folded over the backrest. I felt like I was in an old-person's house.

My confusion frustrated my aunt, because she shook my arm and she urgently said, "Harry Potter, you will listen to me, this instant."

Now, the name "Harry Potter" is instantly recognizable for me. In America, there was so much Harry Potter merchandise floating around that it was nearly impossible to escape the iconic Harry Potter image. So, when my aunt said "Harry Potter" I looked up at her.

Even then, I did not associate the name Harry Potter with myself. I was just looking at this tall plain woman, who was roughly holding my forearm high above my head, and waited for her to complete her opinion about Harry Potter, because it seemed like everyone in the western world had one and, in a weird way, everyone was expected to be conversant about the plot.

However, Petunia did not continue with her thought, she just looked at me as I drunkenly swayed in front of her. With a disgusted curl to her lips, she shook my arm again and angrily said, "What is wrong with you? I will not take you to a doctor, do you hear? I will not. I am not going to waste good money on a bellyache, so stop behaving like this."

At this point in my new life, I could barely understand a word that Petunia was saying. She was speaking too fast and her accent was too thick for me to easily follow her point; not to mention, she was talking to me like she knew me, which didn't make any sense, because I had never seen this woman before in my life. In other words, she looked nothing like the actress from the Harry Potter movies and "Harry Potter" was such an often kicked around conversation where I come from that her directing those words at me made me think that it was some weird English curse or exclamation, not that she was calling me by name.

Consequently, for the first ten or so minutes after I woke up, Petunia and I stood in the hallway, slightly to the left of the archway into the family room, and had this weird confrontation that made her angry and me confused. Slowly, it dawned on me that Petunia was extremely tall and I was extremely small.

I looked down at myself then, seeing the blue plaid pajama pants, the baggy brown T-shirt, and two naked feet with dirty toenails. Petunia wore house-slippers, white socks, high-wasted yellow pleated pants, a tucked-in white blouse, and her hair still done up in curlers.

My mind whirled in confusion. Everything was too weird and it felt like I had been shoved into a costume and expected to play a part in some major motion picture, without first knowing my lines. Petunia was talking again, but I couldn't understand the rhythm of her speech, so whatever she said, flew right over my head and, then suddenly, I wetting my pants.

I suppose it was here, at this moment, that I became aware that my body had other differences than just being smaller than my previous adult height of 5 foot and 7 inches. I looked down at my crotch and watched as my pajamas became wet with my urine. I consciously tried to stop the flow, but I couldn't. Whatever message I was sending from my brain to my bladder wasn't working, and in an abstract state of mind, I took note that the pattern of wetness in the front of my pajamas was different from what it had been in the past.

Petunia was furious at my accident. She slapped me across the face, dragged me to the hallway bathroom, and threw me inside, screaming that I was a "filthy, disgusting boy."

That's when I finally snapped to 100% wakefulness, and felt the deep seeded embarrassment of an adult wetting their pants in front of a witness. The embarrassment was so strong, that I started to cry as I pealed my wet clothes down my legs, only to suck in a shocked breath upon first seeing my body's immature penis.

My attention was pulled away from my unbelievable new predicament to the sound of Petunia stomping around outside the bathroom, ranting about something – probably me - and I remembered the reason why I was standing half-naked in the bathroom. That sense of extreme embarrassment returned but it was mixed now with surprise, wonder, and even panic, like I had done something wrong in waking up as a little boy, though, I do not know how I could have avoided this situation to begin with. Not die, I suppose.

Anyway, I quickly tore off my T-shirt, turned on the shower, and stepped beneath the spray. With the shower as my excuse, I looked again at my new penis and could only marvel that this was happening to me at all, and that this was not a weird dream I'd wake up from.

So reader, here is my answer to the question of how I felt once I realized I had gone from being an adult female to an immature male: I felt surprised.

There was no sense of disgust or dismay or loss of identity in what I felt, just an overriding sense of surprise and bewilderment at my new situation. There was also the smallest hint of thankfulness too, that I was male and not female, which stings my pride as a woman to admit.

You see, even in the time of 2014 in the United States of America, women are slightly less prized than men and I felt that rejection all my life. When I was a child, my father behaved awkwardly around me, but would readily wrestle with my two brothers and talk about school and girls. During my school days, the boys would receive the new sports uniforms and the girls were left with the old handy-down jerseys. As an adult, men were promoted faster than I was, which was the same in most governmental organizations, and they were also paid a higher salary. I also saw that people were more likely to follow a man's leadership than a woman's, and the list just goes on and on.

In conclusion, to find myself suddenly in the body of a Caucasian male, young though the body was, I felt surprised, confused, and thankful. Now there's an honest answer you won't hear often, so appreciate it for what it is.

However, the shock of the change from adult to child, from female to male, from American to English, was severe, and so, standing in that shower, with the hot water beating down upon my head, I began to shake in reaction.

Still cognizant of the reason why a shower was warranted, I reached for the white bottle of shampoo and squirted some into my hand to wash my hair and suds up the rest of my body. I had been a mother of a little boy for ten years and the wife of an adult man for thirteen, so I knew to make sure to carefully clean the inside of my penis' foreskin. This simple act of hygiene was enough for my brain to fully accept that the penis belonged to my new body, ergo it was my penis and I was now male.

I don't know if I should have fought this realization or strived to maintain a sense of femininity in my new identity. Truthfully, though, those are things that I never once thought about before or sense. It is only with the writing about my experiences and the trying to answer a reader's questions before they have to ask them that these thoughts have come up. But, at the time of that shower, I was just too shocked to really care about the rest of the unnecessary societal expectations of a recently experienced female to male switch.

When my shower was complete, I turned off the water, grabbed a towel and went to stand in front of the sink. I was too short to see myself in the mirror, so I climbed up on the toilet and leaned cross-wise over the sink and saw the face of my new reflection.

My first thought was that I was very young and the color of my eyes was very pretty. They were a pure shade of green, with no hints of hazel or brown within the iris.

My hair was a shaggy batch of dark-brown and black curls. I had distinct black eyebrows and black eyelashes, which contrasted nicely with the green color of my eyes. I smiled at my reflection, and saw that I had a full complement of baby teeth, none of which were missing yet. All in all, I had the striking coloring that a girl would kill for, and I had the little-boy cuteness that could make millions in the movies.

That was a startling thought and it was one I donated a few minutes to actually think about further, despite the newness of my situation. You see, almost every American hoarded the secret desire to become a movie star, and I was now a cute little boy with pretty eyes and an adult's sense of self-discipline. All that equaled to the possibility of me becoming a very successful child-actor, a career path that hadn't really been open to Erica Thompson, although, I had not been ugly in my past life either.

I was still looking in the mirror when Petunia stormed into the bathroom and shouted, "Harry Potter, get down off that sink immediately and get dressed."

The surprise of Petunia's sudden entrance and loud voice caused me to push away from the sink and crouch on the lid of the toilet. This had the unintended side effect of knocking my towel loose, resulting in me accidently flashing my aunt.

If Petunia had been a normal decent woman, she would have ignored my nakedness and would have continued on with her business. But Petunia was not normal or decent and I had urinated in her hallway not even a half-hour ago, so she was looking for an excuse to strike me again and here was the perfect opportunity.

Petunia swung at my face, but I was watching her this time so I moved out of the way of her hand. However, Petunia was insistent, so she grabbed my shoulder to hold me still, and slapped me three times about the face and head. The last slap landed on the crown of my head, after I had ducked my face away from her hands.

"Get dressed you disgusting boy, and I never want to see that thing again. Am I clear?" Petunia said, her nails digging into the flesh of my shoulder. I nodded that I understood, but that was not the correct response, and she shook me hard and asked, "Are you an animal or are you a person? Use your words."

Now there were two questions floating between us, and I was at a loss on how to answer. Never before had I met with such overt violence and antagonism, so the fact that I was being struck and shook was just as shocking as the fact that I was now a boy-child and not an adult woman.

"I understand," I finally said, but I forgot that I thought as an American and, therefore, I spoke as an American.

Petunia, immediately noticed my American accent and this annoyed her enough that she grabbed my ear and twisted it, and said, "I don't like smart mouths, Harry. Do you need me to wash your mouth out, so you learn to speak like a proper Englishman?"

"No," I said as I tried to wrench her hand away from my ear, her nails were sharp and they felt like they were cutting into the cartilage.

Apparently my "no" was English-sounding enough so that she released my ear and said, "Fine then. Get dressed and then come find me. You have chores to do and I want them done right, this time, or else I'll have Vernon deal with you."

When Petunia left the bathroom, I sat down on the toilet lid, my hands shaking in my lap. In my past life, I had not been a violent person and confrontation of any kind had taken a lot of courage for me. So the fact that this woman was so aggressive towards me, a tiny little boy, was baffling and very sad.

Before I moved out of the bathroom, I leaned across the sink again to see my reflection one more time, to cement this new face into my mind as belonging to me. I stared at myself, seeing the potential within the lines of my face that promised I would grow into an attractive adult, if given the opportunity. I pushed up my floppy bangs to see my hairline, and that's when I finally saw the lightning bolt shaped scar on the left side of my forehead, with the very tip of the scar just barely breaching the plane of my left eyebrow.

"Holy shit," I said in astonishment, as I stared at myself with new understanding. I wasn't just a random little boy with black hair and green eyes living in an abusive household somewhere in England. I was Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived, the most mundane magical hero I had ever had the misfortune to read about, and I was fated to die so that Voldemort could be killed and the magical world could live.

This was not good. This was not good at all.

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**Author's Note: **Here ends the introduction and the first chapter. I hope that the fact that I included them together isn't too confusing. I hope you all enjoyed this, and I would dearly like to hear your reviews. Please give an honest critique. If you find a problem with my story, I would like to hear about it.

Thank you for reading,  
Nee339


	2. Chapter 2: Escaping Fate

**New Eyes, New Perspective**  
By Nee339

**Summary:** This is an experimental quasi self-insert/Harry replacement story. The story won't religiously adhere to canon and there will be deviations. You have been warned. Further warnings for Harsh Language, Sexual Situations, Violence, Original Character, and Alternate Universe/Alternate Reality.

**Author's Notes:** Please review with your thoughts. They help me see the mistakes that I've made. Thank you.

* * *

**Chapter Two: Escaping Fate**

The little boy in the mirror looked worried. His mouth was set in a grim straight line, and his dark eyebrows were drawn close together, casting a deep shadow over his light-colored eyes.

"Poor boy. You were a victim from the start," I whispered, and the boy's mouth moved in tandem with my words. No longer wanting to look upon the face of that traumatized little boy, I averted my gaze from the mirror, sat down on the toilet lid, and tried to think of a way to get out of this house for good, because I did not believe I could live the Harry-Potter-life for very long.

No matter how I rationalized Petunia's earlier behavior, I could not forgive the fact that she had acted completely out of proportion to the trouble I'd caused this morning. Granted, I did accidentally pee in the hallway, but that event did not justify Petunia coming into the bathroom and slapping me in face multiple times. I was in the body of a little boy and children as young as me often had accidents during this stage of their development, so Petunia's reaction had been very inappropriate and overly violent.

I had been sitting on the toilet for a few minutes, thinking about the implications of my situation, when I heard footsteps walk past the bathroom door and Petunia start talking. It took me a second to adjust my hearing to understand her accent, so used was I to the gentle southern drawl of rural Missouri, but I soon realized that she was complaining about me to someone. At first I thought she talking on the telephone, but the sound of a man's voice asking, "And then what happened?" in response to one of Petunia's statements, disabused me of that notion.

I remembered from the books that Petunia was married to a fat man named Vernon, and so I assumed that was to whom she was speaking. I was proven correct a moment later, when the pitch of Petunia's voice changed from angry to worried as she said, "Vernon, maybe he had a seizure or something. It could be serious. We might have to take him to hospital or there could be consequences from my sister's people. You know how they are."

Petunia's concern for my well being surprised me, considering that she had shaken me and had hit me in the face not that long ago. Therefore, I figured her concern was somehow self-serving, because I was in the mood to believe the worst of Petunia and, in extension, her husband.

Vernon shushed Petunia and said in answer, to her worry, "Hush now dear, if the boy continues to have problems, we'll take him to hospital then. This morning could have been a one-time thing and, if we rush out right now and get him looked at, we would have only spent good money for a bad cause. Now, relax and let's have some breakfast."

"Unbelievable," I said, sotto voce, as I listened to Vernon and Petunia walk into the kitchen.

When the hallway was empty, I stood up, re-secured the towel around my hips, and walked out of the bathroom and down the hall to my cupboard under the stairs, to get dressed. Once done, I sat down on my cot and put my head in my hands and tried to think of a way to help myself.

The Harry Potter in the book series never managed to leave the Dursleys; so, assuming that J. K. Rowling's book was like divine law in this universe, I would have to break away from the plot. I refused to stay here and assume the role of the battered boy-hero just because a woman from another world wrote some bad books. Rowling could go fuck herself if she didn't like it.

"I will not be a victim," I whispered into the darkness of my cupboard, trying to imbue the statement with a sense of resolve and confidence. Unfortunately, I was unsuccessful. Kids were always victims of the world around them, whether it be due to something as minor as being unjustly punished for a small infraction or actively targeted by a human predator, the fact remained that children were the property and responsibility of their guardians and I was now one among their number, which was just freaking fantastic.

Regrettably, I didn't get any more time to plan and figure things out, because my cupboard door suddenly swung open and, standing there in the doorway, was my new cousin, Dudley.

"Hey stupid, mom wants you in the kitchen," he said, authoritatively, his accent clipping sharply at the end of each word.

_Now here's a child with power_, I thought as I took in Dudley's appearance and manner. My cousin looked nothing like the child-actor in the Harry Potter movies and neither did he resemble Rowling's puerile description of a pig or a baby whale. Although Dudley was not an attractive child, he had not yet crossed the threshold into obesity. In actuality, he was a thick-bodied-boy, with a large head, a long flat face, a square chin, blonde hair, hazel eyes, a pink mouth, and he positively exuded self-confidence.

"Okay. I'll go," I said and carefully stood up from the cot and slid past Dudley. I expected Dudley to hit me, because that's what would have happened in the books, but he didn't. Instead, he walked into the family room and turned on the television, leaving me to look after him oddly.

According to the books, Dudley had been one of Harry's main tormentors, but the behavior I had just witnessed put me in mind of antagonistic siblings, not of an abusive larger cousin. Maybe that aspect of the Harry Potter and Dudley relationship hadn't started yet, but my cousin's bored disregard of my presence forced me to think beyond the Rowling-storyline.

I swiveled my head from my cousin to the kitchen archway, and I tried to put the pieces together. In the books, Dudley had been the main aggressor during Harry's early childhood, but here and now, it was Petunia who exhibited the most anger and hostility towards me. Then again, I had to remind myself that I'd barely been awake in this new world for an hour, so I didn't know anything about these people nor did I fully understand the family's dynamics except for what I've read in the books and seen in the movies, which were proving to be inaccurate.

I almost smiled at that realization. Story inaccuracies meant that escape was possible and, although I was not fully decided on what I would do with myself once I got out of the house, I was determined to leave and make a new future somewhere else. I'd probably change my name too. "Harry Potter" was too iconic and too dangerous.

"Boy! Get in here now or you won't eat for the rest of the day," Petunia called from the kitchen.

Obediently, I walked into the kitchen to find Petunia waiting for me by the sink and Vernon busily eating his breakfast and reading the morning newspaper.

Vernon looked much younger than the actor who had portrayed him in the movie, which made sense considering that he was in his mid-30s and significantly younger than the Vernon-actor. From what I could see of him, I judged that Vernon was only about fifty or so pounds overweight and the extra weight wasn't very noticeable, except for the slightest pouching of his stomach over his leather belt; thereby invalidating Rowling's description of Vernon resembling a walrus.

Actually, Vernon looked like a matured version of Dudley only with blue eyes instead of hazel, a well-groomed brownish-blonde mustache, and a short businessman haircut. Maybe, by the time Harry was 11 years old, things would have changed enough to warrant Rowling's descriptions, but right now, they just seemed mean-spirited and designed to bias the reader against Harry's family, because the Dursleys looked like normal, slightly unattractive, people.

"Harry Potter, I have better things to do than to wait for you. Now get over here," Petunia said, angrily. I stopped watching Vernon and looked over at Petunia.

Ever since I'd woken up this morning, Petunia had a sense of meanness about her expression that transformed her face, which was a shame, since her plain features could have been pleasant if she'd just stop scowling. It was no secret that Petunia wasn't happy.

"Well come here," Petunia said, aggravated, one of her hands hidden by the lip of the sink, like she was holding something. As soon as I was close enough to reach, Petunia grabbed my left hand, turned it so it was palm up, and then quickly tipped a pot over my hand causing a steaming hot, hard-boiled-egg to fall into it.

"Bitch!" I gasped in surprised pain, as I automatically released the egg and shook my hand, trying to cool the burn. The shell crunched as it hit the floor.

"What did you say, boy?" Vernon asked dangerously, his attention focused solely on me. I tried to cringe away, but Petunia still had hold of my hand, and I couldn't pull it free.

"Nothing," I said immediately, knowing that I stood no chance against this giant of a man if he decided to punish me for my bad language. I dearly hoped that he had better things to do this morning than to hit me for cussing at his wife.

Still glaring angrily at me, Vernon said, "Then watch your mouth, boy, or I'll watch it for you. Are we clear?"

In truth, we weren't clear. I had no idea how he planned to watch my mouth for me, but I assumed he had meant his statement as some form of threat, like he'd hit me or maybe make me chew on some soap to teach me a lesson. Either way, I nodded in answer to his question. I did not like pain and I would not purposefully antagonize large violent men just to prove a point.

"Good," Vernon said as he stood up from the kitchen table. He handed his plate to Petunia and then walked right up to me and, bowing at the hip so he loomed threateningly over me, he said, "Behave yourself or you'll answer to me."

"Yes sir," I acknowledged. The large man nodded, straightened up, and walked out of the kitchen.

"Have a good day Dudley," Vernon said from the hallway as he pulled on his suit jacket.

"You too Dad."

Vernon must have thought that Dudley's response was funny or cute or both, because he laughed and said, "You're a chip off the old block, son. Be good and help your mother keep the boy in line."

"Okay Dad," Dudley said, his voice sounding distracted. I couldn't see my cousin from where I was standing, but I assumed his distraction was caused by the television.

Once Vernon had left the house, Petunia's attention returned to me. She pointed at the egg on the floor and said, "You're a stupid boy. Pick it up and eat it quickly. We have to go to the store and buy school supplies to bring them to the elementary school today. The teachers want to meet everyone before the first day."

"Okay," I said as I bent down to pick up the egg, Petunia kept talking, warning me about abnormal behavior and so on and so forth. I stopped listening because, quite frankly, Petunia's ranting about me made her sound crazy and that made me uncomfortable. I didn't know how to deal with a crazy person, let alone one with a violent obsession towards me; so instead, I quickly pealed the egg over the trashcan and ate it in four big bites.

After I had finished eating, I realized that I was thirsty, so I left the kitchen and went into the bathroom to drink from the faucet. My new body couldn't quite reach the taps, so I was forced to climb up on the toilet again, and lean across the sink until I was in line to slurp the water straight from the faucet.

_I really need to brush my teeth_, I thought as I straightened up and started to look around for my toothbrush, assuming that it would be in this bathroom considering that it was the closest to my cupboard, but I couldn't find it. So, I left the downstairs bathroom and went upstairs to look for other bathrooms that might have a toothbrush that could be mine. While I searched, I kept one ear trained on Petunia's voice as she tried to coax Dudley out of his pajamas and into jeans and a T-shirt to go to the store. Apparently, Dudley was being uncooperative.

Anyway, on the second floor of the house, there were two bathrooms and four bedrooms. In the first upstairs bathroom, I noticed that it was obviously the one most used by Dudley. Bathtub toys sat in a basket by the tub, and the sink and mirror were splattered with toothpaste, either from vigorous brushing or from Dudley flinging the foam around. But in all that mess, there was only one toothbrush in evidence, not two.

"Harry Potter better have brushed his teeth since the death of his parents," I said in a soft and angry voice, worried that it might carry downstairs to Petunia's spiteful ears.

Moving on, the second upstairs bathroom was located off the master bedroom. It was an adult version of Dudley's bathroom, complete with toothpaste splatters on the sink and mirror, as well as a man's shaving equipment and aftershave cologne, two different types of deodorant, a hairbrush, a drawer full of makeup, hair-elastics, headbands, and perfume.

"So gross," I said as I resigned myself to digging through the cabinet drawers in search of a new toothbrush or floss. I refused to die because of some disgusting dental infection brought about by four years of tooth and gum neglect. It would be too embarrassing.

"Fucking Dursleys," I said when I finally found some floss, buried deep in Petunia's makeup drawer. I took my prize over to Dudley's bathroom, stepped up on the stepstool put there for Dudley's convenience, and started to saw away at my teeth with the mint-flavored floss. I made a mental note to steal a toothbrush later today.

Once done, I tiptoed downstairs only to be graced with the sight of Petunia dressing Dudley in front of the television, as he sat on the couch enraptured by the child's program that he was watching. I almost laughed, because I had experienced quite a few days as Erica Thompson when I had to wrestle Bryan into his school clothes otherwise the boy would have gone to school in his pajamas without a care in the world.

The sudden reminder of my son slammed home the reality of my situation. I wasn't just a displaced adult soul in the body of a child; I was in an entirely new world – one where Harry Potter was real – and also back in the 1980s if I had judged the technology level correctly. My son wasn't born yet and my husband would be a child in either middle or high school; I didn't know which one since I wasn't sure on today's date. Of course, that was all assuming that Darren Thompson was even alive in this world.

Needing privacy, I slipped into the darkness of my cupboard and sat down on the cot and silently cried, grieving for the loss of my old life, a life that had been well lived and well loved, only for it to be replaced with this barren life of Harry Potter, a life of sacrifice and pain. Despite the possible existence of magic, I found the exchange to be uneven.

My family had been everything to me and now they were gone, with no possibility of them ever being returned to me, and that wasn't fair. I had been a good person in my last life. I didn't deserve this punishment.

While sitting in the dark, I lost track of time thinking over all that I had lost and all that I had yet to do to ensure the safety of this body. The list was extensive and I was very bitter about the necessity of its existence.

My brooding was cut short when my cupboard was opened and I was harshly pulled into the hallway, an event that was extremely reminiscent from this morning. This time, though, I did not wet myself and I was instantly understanding of my circumstances. Besides, if I had been in anyway confused, Petunia quickly set me straight, by saying, "Come along, now, boy. I don't trust you in the house alone."

Petunia did not let go of my wrist as she matched to the front door and outside towards the car. She opened the back seat and harshly pushed me inside, saying, "Get in," before turning to Dudley and saying, "Here sweetums, come sit up front with mommy." Dudley complied and Petunia closed the door after he had sat down and walked around to the driver's side.

While I watched this little event play out, I couldn't help contrasting the differences between parenting in the 1980s and parenting in the 2000s. Within those twenty years, so many things had changed to the point that it was extremely rare to find a child younger than 10 years old sitting in the front seat for fear of the airbag and the child not meeting the required weight restrictions. At least, that's how it was in America. It could have been completely different in England.

In fact, a child of my size, in the 2000s would have been placed in a booster seat for added safety. Instead, I was allowed full range of the back seat without any requirements of wearing a seat belt. Then again, that might have been due to Petunia's disregard of my safety, because Dudley was wearing his seat belt.

After a short drive, we arrived at the general store. Petunia grabbed a shopping cart, allowed Dudley to climb into the large front basket, and started walking up and down the aisles, looking for the items on the school's supply list. I trailed behind the mother and son, making only two stops of my own. The first was to pilfer a toothbrush and the second was to locate a newspaper to read the day's date. Today was Friday, August 16, 1985.

_I guess I'm starting kindergarten, _I thought, as I trailed far behind Petunia and Dudley. I wasn't surprised by this information, just a bit daunted by it. As Erica Thompson, I had gone to school for over twenty years of my life. There had been the required thirteen years of school from kindergarten through senior year of high school, the four and a half years as an undergrad in a university, and the three years as a master student in yet another university. In short, I was not looking forward to having to redo all that work. It had been hard enough the first time through.

To complicate matters, within six years, Hogwarts would come demanding seven years of my life to mold me into the magical world's ideal sacrificial lamb; thereby, irreparably disrupting my education. Assuming that I lived through that ordeal, instead of graduating from high school with a diploma, I would have to take a high school equivalency test, which wasn't nearly as prestigious or as marketable on a résumé.

In short, I was in trouble. Either I would have to find a job in the magical world after my Hogwarts graduation or I'd have to come up with a believable story of why I disappeared from the normal world for seven years. The easiest option would obviously be to find employment in the magical world, but judging by Rowling's books, there weren't many job opportunities other than the Ministry of Magic, and Rowling had made sure to portray that organization as one giant racist joke of a government and not something I would want to spend my life supporting.

Another option for my future would be to return to the normal world with some type of magical solution that would allow me to bypass all the constraints modern society liked to put on personal advancement. Except, I did not like that plan either. There were too many unknowns and too many assumptions involved in its application. Rowling had already been proven partially incorrect in her story, so who's to say that she wasn't wrong about the utility of magic as well. I could very easily find myself in a situation where levitating a desk wouldn't be enough.

In the end, I could only see two ways of getting the diploma I needed while also justifying my disappearance from school only to reappear when I was 18 years old. The first was to present myself as a genius, but that had the single most glaring problem of, after high school, I could no longer pretend to be smarter than I was, unless I stayed within my previous field of expertise. However, forestry and wildlife ecology was not a field that usually attracted many bona fide child-geniuses. Normally, they went into the more prestigious and/or lucrative sciences.

My second option was to cram thirteen years of schooling into the next six years, complete with a paper trail of evidence. The only way that this could be truly feasible was to take myself out of public schooling and have myself home schooled. That way, I wouldn't be constrained by the pace of the classroom, and could therefore breeze through the subjects at a pace more comfortable to me. Considering my previous familiarity with the subjects in question, particularly with Math, Biology, Ecology, Geography, and English, home school would be my best alternative overall. There was only one problem with this plan – the Dursleys.

The Dursleys did not like me. This fact had been very evident in how they had treated me since the very beginning. Therefore, it was erroneous for me to think that the Dursleys would be in any way predisposed to helping me accomplish any of my personal goals. They hadn't even given me a toothbrush, why would they ever help me graduate from high school early? So the Dursleys, being the wonderful people that they were, would force me into public school because the law required them to and I would be trapped there until I graduated or tested out, thereby, bringing me back to the problem of not being smart enough to be considered a genius.

All this worrying only served to emphasize my need to get away from the Dursleys, but how was I supposed to leave without finding myself in a worse situation or right back under their care? I didn't yet know the answer to this question, but I did know that I had to leave before Hogwarts sent me its damning letter.

I looked over at Petunia and Dudley, they were arguing about which crayon box Dudley should buy, the 24- or the 32-box of Crayola crayons, when I was struck with a brilliantly simple answer to my problem. All I would need was the courage to see it through, but I knew that I would definitely be leaving the Dursleys tonight, for good.

I almost smiled, then. The only reason I didn't was because I remembered that these teeth hadn't been brushed properly in four years.

The shopping trip was soon over and Petunia had us driving towards to St. Grogory Primary School where we were supposed to meet our kindergarten teacher and put away our school supplies. I remembered attending similar gatherings with my own children.

The school hosted these orientations with the intention of familiarizing the children with the teacher before their first day. Generally, it facilitated an easier transition for the child than if he or she had been dropped off on the doorstep of a stranger. It also gave nervous parents a chance to ask questions and to be reassured by the teacher about the safety of their kids when leaving them at school for the first time.

"Hurry up, boy. I can't stand how you lag behind," Petunia said as she marched down the hallway of classrooms full of new students and chattering parents.

I made a contemptuous face at her back. I wasn't that far behind her and, more to the point, I had learned my lesson early this morning. I was not going to walk within easy striking distance. If she wanted to hit me, she'd have to chase me down first.

"Mommy, I don't want to go to school," Dudley complained, effectively distracting Petunia from me.

Taking Dudley's hand in hers, Petunia knelt down in front of her son, and said, "Sweetums, you're going to love school. You'll make so many friends and you'll become so smart and you'll look so handsome in your uniform. There's nothing to worry about because school is going to be so much fun."

After listening to her speech, I could almost believe that Petunia was a good mother. I could see that she had said the right words to calm Dudley, because he was smiling and walking confidently beside her, again.

"Here we are, room 103. Look at the sign, Dudley, it's shaped like a heart and your new teacher's name is Mrs. Harte. Isn't that clever?"

In response, Dudley said, "Yes," while exaggeratedly nodding his head up and down. I couldn't tell if he truly thought the sign was clever or if he was just a goofy little boy paying lip service to his mother. Either way, Petunia smiled down at my cousin and patted his head.

Personally, I didn't think the sign was clever. I thought it was kind of hokey and something only done to amuse small children and, even then, they didn't think it was that funny. But no one had asked me what I thought. Suffice it to say, I was not anxious to walk into this classroom. I would have preferred a nap instead, but it didn't look like I was going to be getting one any time soon.

"Oh look at all toys over there, Dudley," Petunia said as walked inside the classroom, pointing at something out of sight from my position. Dudley immediately perked up and bulldozed his way forward.

After waiting a few seconds to let them clear the doorway, I took a deep breath, and followed, feeling like I was somehow walking into a trap. I was not wrong. Petunia was waiting for me and I wasn't fast enough to avoid her grabbing hold of my arm and pulling me along behind her.

Petunia purposefully walked up to the front of the room where a middle-aged woman was standing and pushed me forward. Gesturing at me, Petunia said, "Mrs. Harte, this is my sister's son, Harry Potter…"

What followed next was so ridiculous that I couldn't stop myself from gaping up at my aunt in surprise. I had known that she was a bitch, but I had been unprepared to hear her so blatantly lie about me to my kindergarten teacher. What made it worse, was that everything she said could have easily been refuted had Petunia not made sure to speak loud enough to draw the attention of every parent in the classroom. With so many concerned parental ears hearing this story, I'd have had to be Mahatma Gandhi to convince anyone of the truth after that farce.

Therefore, I just stood there and listened as Petunia told Mrs. Harte that I had probably suffered from some undiagnosed brain damage from the car accident that had killed my parents, because I was very slow to understand things, and that I was obstinate to the point of being unreasonable, and that I liked to hide in the most peculiar places. She also said that I lied and that I stole things and that I sometimes hurt people by stabbing them with pencils. She'd even said that I had caught and tortured our neighbor's cat before being discovered in the tool shed with the bloody carcass in a shoebox.

To hear Petunia tell it, I was the next Damien, son of Lucifer, here to sow despair and discord among the masses, and to reap the bloody fruit from the unwary.

"Oh dear," Mrs. Harte said, her once pleasant smiling face was now serious and concerned, as she looked down at me.

"Yes, it is a tragic story," continued Petunia, "but I put this all down on his paperwork when signing him up for school and the secretary assured me that you would still take him and educate him. She said you had special classes for disruptive students like him. So you can imagine my surprise when I saw that Dudley and Harry both had the same room assignment. That made me think that you didn't understand the seriousness of the situation or you thought Dudley was like Harry, so that's why I came right up to you, first thing, and told you everything. It's not right to place other children in a potentially unsafe environment if they don't know what to expect from a boy like Harry. I know how to deal with Harry and so does Dudley, but other people will be taken by surprise."

My surprise had shifted to anger long ago. What angered me the most about the whole incident was that not a single person questioned the validity of my aunt's story. All of them just seemed to accept my aunt's word as the gospel truth. There were quite a few curious looks sent in my direction, probably trying to see the psychopath hidden beneath my little boy disguise.

"I don't want my son in the same classroom as that boy," said a kindergartener's father. He was tall and handsome and obviously charismatic, so it wasn't long before other parents were expressing similar desires for me to be removed from this classroom if not removed from the school all together.

It didn't take long for Mrs. Harte to give in to the crowd's demands. I shook my head in amazement as I watched the charade continue around me. I had not said a single word since walking into this classroom and within five minutes, my aunt had ruined my credibility with these people so that no one would ever believe any of my complaints of child abuse.

For one second, I thought about trying to defend myself against my aunt's accusations, but I decided not to bother. I was leaving the Dursleys, anyway, and making a bigger scene in kindergarten orientation would only make these people more likely to remember me at a later date, and I did not want that. I wanted them to forget my face and my scar, I wanted them to only vaguely remember a boy with dark brown hair and hand-me-down-clothes.

So I did the only thing I could think of that would accomplish that objective, and I slammed my foot down on top of Petunia's sensible but fashionable open-toed shoes with a medium heal, and wrenched my wrist free from her grasp.

"You horrible boy," she said angrily and reached for me again, but this time I was ready for her and was able to dodge and push through the crowd. I was finished with being manhandled by this woman.

The crowd was not that dense that I could not slip between the bodies and the children were still playing in the other half of the room, although, a few of them had stopped to watch their parents demand my removal from the class. A few of them were still watching their parents and saw me as I left the classroom and ran down the hallway.

Relative to my size, I was fast, so I was almost to the end of the hall by the time Petunia breached the classroom doorway.

"Harry Potter, you get back here this instant!" she yelled after me, but I had made up my mind. I was tired of being Harry Potter. His life sucked. Fuck saving the magical world in six years, I needed to save myself now.

The school was not large, so within a minute, I was slamming through the front doors and running into the parking lot. For one wild instant of insanity, I thought seriously about stealing a car, but luckily I regained my mind and remembered that, not only was I too small to reach the peddles, I was an American who was used to driving on the right side of the road, not the left. All I would accomplish was an accident. As a result, I ran to the bike rack, hoping for a miracle.

Even though this was mostly orientation day, with kids arriving with their parents, there were still a few bicycles lined up in the rack. All of them were a bit too big for me, but I didn't need to use the seat to peddle, I just needed to get away fast and, as luck would have it, there three that didn't have bike locks.

I chose the red bike with the old-style banana seat and a basket hanging from the handlebars. I pulled it free of the bike rack and mounted up, noting the difference in weight from the bike I had ridden back in 2014 and just as quickly dismissed the comparison. It was time for me to go.

Just as I had started to peddle when Petunia came striding out of the school's front doors and saw me. With an unattractive snarl on her face, she ran after me, splashing through puddles and getting her yellow pants muddy.

I didn't wait for her. With adrenaline pumping through my veins and with my anger burning hot, I rocketed that bike right past her as I yelled, "Fuck you, bitch!" and flipped her the middle finger.

I don't know if the English understand the bird, but I didn't care. It made me feel good to so vividly show my contempt of that woman that it had me smiling for the rest of the afternoon as I peddled that bike like I was Lance Armstrong.

My escape had been a bit earlier than I had originally planned, but I was free now and I was going to make the best of it. No more being Harry Potter for me. I needed to disappear, and the best way I knew how to do that was in the rolling hills of the country. Out there, I could get my bearings and determine what I wanted to do with myself. Out there was life.

* * *

**Author's Note: **That's the end of the second chapter. Please review with what you think or with any mistakes you've noticed.

Thank you for reading,  
Nee339


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